The Passage
by The Urban Spaceman
Summary: In 1867, convicted murderer Ricardo Alpert is given a choice; execution, or penance. As one of the final victims of the Atlantic Slave Trade, he endures a journey that not all of his fellow slaves survive. It is a voyage of suffering and discovery, in which he witnesses terrible atrocities and learns the true value of a human life.
1. Chapter 1

The Passage

Ricardo Alpert was a nothing-man. He was empty. Hollow. Transparent. The heavy iron manacles which chained him to the man in front and bit painfully into the already-raw skin of his wrists, had the magical ability to make him invisible. He knew this, because as he was marched through the bustling hot streets of _Santa Cruz de Tenerife_, towards the sprawling docks which stretched out along the bay, the eyes of men and women passed right over him. To them, he did not exist. He was no longer a man. He was property, and the free-men and free-women who went about their daily business paid him no more attention than they would a mule or an ox.

He had never been to a city, and he found it a fearful place. So many bodies pressed close together, people calling to each other, men hawking their wares, women gossiping loudly, children shrieking as they ran amok between the temporary stalls and worn stone buildings... the sights and sounds and smells, all vibrant and loud and bitter as sweat, swirled around Ricardo, assaulting his nothing-eyes and his nothing-ears and his nothing-nose from all directions.

Overwhelmed by the sudden onset of claustrophobia despite the open cerulean sky above, he stumbled, and landed painfully on his knees. The crowd which did not see him parted around him, as if some instinct drove them to avoid that empty patch of street. His fall caused the man in front to jerk back, the iron chains rattling angrily. The man turned with a scowl, but then quickly looked back to the front of the procession.

"On your feet!" someone growled from behind in Spanish. Ricardo felt the lash of a whip across his shoulders a heartbeat before he heard the sound of the leather throng snapping through the air. Like a storm, the flash came before the boom.

A second _crack_ and its preceding blossom of pain told Ricardo that his owners were in a hurry to reach the docks. He toyed briefly with the idea of staying on his knees, of pretending to be exhausted and broken. It wasn't far from the truth; it had been three days since he'd had food, almost two since he'd had water. Though his stomach was empty, the foetid smell of rotting fish which was carried by the weak sea-breeze made him want to be sick.

A third lashing of pain caused his body to spasm and his eyes to raise. To his surprise, he found himself looking at someone; someone who looked back. Someone who could see him! It was a child, a little girl, her light brown eyes roaming his face as if trying to memorise it. Perhaps children, then, were immune to the magic and illusions of the iron shackles.

The urge to speak out struck him, but he could not make his parched mouth form the words. _Help me,_ he pleaded with his eyes, but she was only a child, and already her mother was dragging her on, into the throng of shoppers and hawkers. She disappeared from view, and took his hope with her.

Large hands grabbed him roughly from behind, hauling him to his feet. His bruised knees complained at having to support him, and just as he was about to beg for a mouthful of water to quench his thirst, the voice spoke again.

"Keep moving, slave! Captain Hanso is on a tight deadline. If you cause him to be late, the punishment will be severe."

He trudged forward, knowing it was futile to ask for compassion. A pair of shoes would receive no compassion from its owner; Ricardo himself had not shown compassion to the many tools he had used whilst ploughing and hoeing his master's fields. They were just things. Items. Inanimate slaves to humanity, as Ricardo was now a slave to his new masters.

_Slave._

The word tasted bitter in his mouth. For seven years he had worked in the fields of his master, planting and tending the sugarcane, harvesting the crop when it was ready, packing it into barrels and sacks for transport back to Spain. Seven years working for a pittance, saving a small fraction of his meagre wage each week, secreting small coins away in private places, saving for the day when he could afford to pay for passage for himself and Isabella to the New World. Seven years he had slaved away in all but name, and now he would get his wish.

He would go to the New World. But he would not go as a free man. He would not step off the ship and breathe in the air of possibilities, with his wife smiling on his arm. For Isabella lay dead and buried, and he had not even been allowed to attend her funeral. Murderers did not deserve compassion, just as property did not deserve compassion. The love of his life had been buried, her service unattended.

The sea air hit him hard as the small procession came at last to the docks. The stench was unwholesome; rotting fish combined with slurry from the ships which pulled in to port. The water had a thick film of green algae covering it, which only faded to a clearer colour further out in the bay, where the tidal currents brought fresh water. To Ricardo, it seemed a place of sickness, quite unlike the open meadows and dense plantations of his master's lands. Though home was only a couple of hours' carriage ride away, it was untouched by the miasma of salty sea air and the terrible stenches it carried. It was all Ricardo could do to keep himself from retching and gagging as the foul air worked its way into his lungs and through his body.

The procession continued, the three slaves led down the hillside towards the wooden structures which reached out from the shore. Seen from above they were spindly spider-legs, each thin and flimsy, but as he neared, Ricardo saw that they weren't as tenuous as they first seemed. Though each dock was long and narrow, and they criss-crossed here and there, the wood which had made them was strong and firm underfoot, capable of withstanding the natural surges of the tide. When he was forced to step on to one of the structures, he heard the hollow echoes his feet made, and wondered how far it was from the dock to the water.

Not that he was foolish enough to consider jumping to his freedom. The only freedom beyond the edge of the pier was death, for even if he hadn't been chained to two other men, his own chains would have carried him down to a watery grave. Prepared as he was to die rather than live his remaining days as another man's property, he was not yet prepared to condemn his own soul to _infierno._ That was what happened to people who took their own lives; God turned his back on them, and _El Diablo_ claimed their souls.

When at last the hollow thumping of his own footsteps ended, Ricardo found himself standing in shadow, and looked up. Before him sat a wooden behemoth, lolling gently on the water. Only once before had he ever seen a ship, and that from a great distance. It had been sailing along the skyline, fat and lazy, only just visible across the many miles from the coast. Out there, in the endless blue, it had seemed a small thing, no bigger than an ant.

Now he realised he'd had the perspective completely wrong. Ships were not ants; they were bigger than trees. Bigger than houses! These things floated on the water and were moved by the winds... but how could such a thing be so? Nothing this big ought to float. By rights, the ships should sink, or wallow and list at the first squall. Was it an act of God which kept ships afloat, or a trick of the devil?

If it was the devil, he had made his mark on this one. Ricardo spotted words painted on the back of the ship. They were English words, and they said _Black Rock._ He did not know what that meant, because although both words were familiar to him, in combination they made less sense. Rocks did not float; they sank. Why would somebody write sinking words on a ship? Why would they not write on there something to help keep it afloat, like _leaf_ or _feather_?

One of the men in front of him began to pray, a litany of Spanish words issuing from his mouth with great fervour. Ricardo wished he could pray, but the sight of the ship had taken away all thoughts but one.

_I am going to die._

He knew it, as surely as he knew the sun rose every day and set every night. Though he had never seen the ocean, he knew it was very, very large. As large as Heaven. Maybe even as large as Hell. Perhaps larger! How could such a thing as this boat, which compared to him was the size of some biblical giant, possibly survive on an ocean? As soon as it left the dock it would tip over and everybody aboard would die.

"Keep up," said one of the slave-men at the front of the procession. He rattled the chains, forcing the two before Ricardo to follow, and he had no choice but to be dragged along as well.

Forward they were marched, the deck hollow beneath their feet, until they reached a sort of bridge. It was narrow, and made of two planks of wood placed side by side. As the ship or the dock moved with the motion of the sea, the planks rose and fell. Ricardo wondered about their purpose, until, to his horror, one of the slave-men clambered up onto them and walked along them, passing from the dock to the ship.

As the slaves were forced forward, Ricardo felt his head go light, and he prayed that he would faint. His prayer went unanswered, however. One by one the slaves were made to climb up to these planks. What would happen if one of them fell over? He would surely drag the others with him. Together they would sink and drown. Suddenly, death seemed like a less favourable solution to life spent as property.

When it came his turn, he closed his eyes, and let the slaver behind guide him to the right place to step. Then, all three men shuffled forwards. The plank beneath their feet groaned and creaked, and the prayers of the man in front became louder. Ricardo wished the man would shut up. God did not care. Not anymore. The Almighty had let Isabella die. Beautiful, innocent Isabella. She had done nothing to deserve sickness. Nothing to deserve death. She had been obedient. Devout. Loving. She had never committed a sin, never blasphemed, never had any cause to anger the Lord. So if there was no hope of God helping her, then what hope was there for the rest of them?

A short eternity later, the torture ended. The slaves reached the end of the wooden planks, and landed one by one on the surface of the beast-ship. It, too, was wooden and hollow, but compared to the narrow planks it seemed a great distance away from that terrible rolling sea. Each of the chained men sank to their knees as if the boat was their salvation. But it was to be a salvation short-lived.

"Up. All of you, up."

The whip cracked, and then men forced themselves to their feet. Ricardo decided he couldn't take another step; his feet hurt from walking, not because he was weak, but because his shoes were designed for work in the field, thicker on top than on the soles to protect against accidental strikes by farming implements. Since leaving the jail where he'd been imprisoned for the murder of a rich and influential doctor, he'd been forced to walk many miles to the docks of _Santa Cruz de Tenerife._ And, once there, the hard cobble-stones had been painful to his feet. The soft wood of the docks had at first been a relief, but now the numbness had worn off, his blisters were starting to hurt.

The men were leg along the deck, to a patch of darkness which turned out to be a hole to the belly of the ship. All Ricardo could see were ladders leading into pure black. Suddenly, hot and thirsty as he was, he had no desire to enter the cooler hold. He felt certain that if he stepped into that patch of darkness, he would never come out of it again.

The other slaves must have felt the same, for each of them balked at the sight of the hole, as if they feared they might be swallowed and digested by that ship, by that _Black Rock_ which would invariably sink and cause them to die. But the men were no longer people; they were property. At sword-point they were forced down into the chill black. Ricardo, desperate for something to cling to, glanced quickly around, but he saw nothing, not even a railing to which he could grasp and save himself.

A single thing caught his eye. In the far distance, _El Teide_ stood tall and proud. Once, that volcano, quiet for nearly a century, had been a welcome sight. Now, it mocked him, speaking silently, telling him, _Look at me. Look at how free I am. I am only earth and rock, but no man shall ever make me his property._

It was a cruel parting gesture, but it was something to cling to. So, as the chill shadow of the darkness claimed him, as sunlight and fresh air were taken away from him, he remembered the sight of the volcano, and tried to remember what it meant to be free.


	2. Chapter 2

The Passage

Ricardo Alpert was a dead-man. He was a breathing corpse. An aching corpse. He ate and he slept and he perspired. He dwelt in a wooden coffin which floated on the ocean and carried him towards shores he had once only dreamt of. The manacles which had once chained him to the man in front, now tethered him to the inner hull of the boat. There, he was entombed within his own private hell.

The air was thick and heavy, stale enough with the smell of sweat and urine and vomit that breathing it made him feel dizzy and nauseous. As well, there was very little light to see by, for the crew of the ship would not leave a naked flame down here, where one of the slaves might somehow use it to set a fire. Only when the sun shone its brightest did the knotholes of the ship's wooden exterior allow small amounts of light through.

Ricardo had never known claustrophobia, before being forced to walk through _Santa Cruz._ Here, in the bowels of the ship, his fear was honed and intensified. During the day, when thin filaments of light found their way into the hold, he could see from one side of the room to the other, and the distance between the two never seemed wide enough. Sometimes, when a storm brewed and the ship was tossed around by the ocean, he thought that the walls were narrowing, coming closer together, trying to squeeze all the air from his lungs. In a way, the darkness was a blessing; when he could not see the walls, he could imagine they were far away from him.

He was not alone, in his hell. There were nearly fifty chained men, all told, and of those fifty, Ricardo could speak with only four. Two were like him, Canary Islanders born and bred. Silvio had been a farmer of sorts, raising the beetles which were ground up for _cochinilla,_ the red dye with many uses. Hector had lived a less honest life; he'd started out poor, and as a child had become a beggar. Later, he'd learnt how to steal, and lived as a thief. He admitted his crimes openly when asked, and seemed to be unrepentant.

Alfonso was the third Spaniard taken as a slave. He was from Madrid, but did not speak of himself or his life before his capture. Mostly he listened to the others talk of their homes and their lives with a sneer on his face. He alone seemed to have accepted his fate. Where the others spoke in dazed tones of their confusion over their current circumstances, and their fear of what would come next, Alfonso said nothing. If he was afraid, he did not show it. If he was shocked that one minute he could be a free man, and the next nothing more than property, he did not admit it. Almost it seemed that he had somehow _expected_ this to happen.

"They are coming!" said Tito. His Portuguese accent twisted his words, making them harsher than the _habla Canaria_ that Ricardo was used to hearing.

Footsteps echoed above, booted feet travelling across the deck, and then the hatch to the deck was thrown open. Sunlight streamed in, and the slaves turned their faces away from it until their eyes could adjust without being pained. The footsteps continued, moving forward, towards the place where the chains were locked to the ship. Ricardo heard a key being turned, heard the heavy jangle as the chains fell loose, and knew by rote the words which would come next.

"All right, first ten, on your feet. Nice and quiet now, or you'll do without your turn."

Ricardo forced his aching muscles to work. From where he sat with his back against the ship, he lowered and straightened his legs, letting blood flow back in to them. Carefully he shifted his weight and pushed himself to his feet, feeling wobbly as a newborn calf. Now, he had only seconds to adapt to being upright. As soon as the first ten men were standing, they were led towards the hatch.

Daylight assaulted Ricardo as he climbed to the deck. It wasn't particularly sunny, but after a day or two in the hold—he didn't know how frequent these excursions were, because he lost all sense of time in his personal hell—but even the cloud-covered sky made him squint painfully. The others, he saw, were much the same. Silvio and Tito rubbed at their eyes, whilst Hector stumbled with the effort of standing, and Alfonso took a deep breath of refreshing sea air.

Two weeks ago, the smell of the sea had made Ricardo feel sick. But after a fortnight or longer in the ship's belly, the salty tang was the sweetest thing he had ever breathed. Like dehydrated men drinking their first water in days, they stood there gulping in the fresh air, savouring the fact that out here, it did not smell of sweat and urine and vomit.

Behind the small group of Europeans came five more chained men, their dark skin slick with sweat. The negros had already been in the hold when Ricardo was brought there. None of them spoke Spanish, or if they did, they did not acknowledge the fact, and none responded to Ricardo and Tito's attempts to engage them in English. For the most they remained quiet, speaking in their own tongues, cursing with words that neither Ricardo nor the crew of the ship could understand.

"Begin your exercise," one of the crew called. The whip was cracked through the air, though after two weeks of ship-life, it was hardly needed. It was used more to remind the slaves that if they did not act quickly enough, they would be punished. As one the men surged forward, jogging at a comfortable pace around the deck.

The exercise was welcome for the relief it brought to aching and stiff limbs, but it also had the unpleasant effect of causing the chains to chafe even more. Every slave's wrists were sore, some of them bleeding, and Ricardo knew that one or two of those still below were hiding infections from their captors for fear that their hands might be chopped off.

After twenty or so laps of the ship, the slaves were ordered to stop. Breathing heavily, Ricardo waited beside Silvio, preparing for what would come next. Several of the deck-hands, boys who were not yet men, lowered metal pails down over the side of the ship, feeding them into the ocean on sturdy ropes. When the buckets were full they were raised, and each slave was doused with cold sea-water. Even though he had experienced this several times, Ricardo still gasped from the shock of the cold, and the pain of the salty water as it ran down his shackle-bitten wrists. His dirt-stained labourer's clothes were stained and salt-crusted from these ritual bathings.

Once every slave had been christened with a bucket of sea water, a large keg was rolled onto the deck. The deck-hands then took out small tankards and began filling them with the pale brown, frothy liquid from the keg. Each tankard which was filled was then handed to a slave, and they drank.

The first time this had happened, none of the slaves had known what to think. The negros had tried to back away, possibly convinced this was some sort of poison, and neither Ricardo nor his fellow Spaniards had liked the look of the liquid. Aware that the slaves weren't going to comply unless they were forced, and possibly believing that forcing them to drink would be more trouble than it was worth, the first-mate had explained, in a steady stream of English, the purpose of the drink.

Ricardo had not understood. The man's words were not those which could be found in the Bible, and he struggled to make sense of what was said. Tito, however, had come from some sort of a medical background, and he was more fluent in English than Ricardo. He translated into Spanish what the first-mate said.

"It is called grog. The crew drink it to stop them getting sick. They say we are to drink it too."

"I don't feel sick," said Hector, glancing suspiciously at the first-mate.

"Not now. But you might do, later."

"Why do they care if we get sick?" asked Silvio.

"For the same reason they exercise us," said Alfonso, in his superior tone. "Healthy slaves are worth more than sick ones. And dead slaves are worth nothing. The captain of this ship might not want to keep us all; he may sell some of us on, once we reach the Americas. And if he does choose to sell, he knows he will get more for us if we are healthy. It is in his own best interests to keep us well."

"I don't have all day to listen to you people babble," the first-mate spoke up in English. "Drink the grog, or we will make you drink. We'll probably have to force the bloody Africans to it anyway."

Tito had shared a glance with Ricardo, a slight nod of his head indicating it would be better for everyone if they complied. They had each taken a mug off the scummy liquid, tasting it slowly, each of them pulling his face at the bitter-sweet flavour. But although it didn't taste nice, it was obviously not a poison, and as he drank, Ricardo felt himself relaxing, his body warming after the cold water bath. In fact, it had almost been pleasant. Hector and Alfonso had drunk after that, and despite the first-mate's predictions, the negros were coaxed into drink it too. All they needed to see was that those who had consumed it first weren't writhing around in agony.

Now, Ricardo took a cup without question, and drank his fill of the foul grog, enjoying the warmth which it spread through his body. Such a simple pleasure, and one of the only ones to be found here, on this ship-shaped coffin.

Their exercise and bathing over, they were led back down below deck, into the stinking, stifling, stale air of the hold. Ricardo felt his pupils widen as they tried to absorb what little light was available down here, and he shivered when he saw the walls of the ship closing in around him once more. The chains jangled as they were re-fastened, and then the next group of men were being led up onto the deck. The half-hour in the fresh air had been a brief, cathartic reprieve, and now it was over.


	3. Chapter 3

The Passage

One of the negros was sick. Ricardo could hear the man moaning quietly across the hold, mumbling something in a strange old language as he rolled about on the floor, his arms held close to his stomach. The chains rattled as he rolled, a musical accompaniment to the agonal groans. Instinctively, those closest to him tried to move away, but there was nowhere to move to. The chains which bound them to the ship had very little slack.

Over the course of several hours, the man's groaning became louder, and more pained. Each groan made Ricardo flinch, a sympathetic reaction he could not control. After every groan he expected one of the crew to come down from above, to find out what was going on, but when nobody came, he guessed that groaning slaves were nothing out of the ordinary to these people.

As the ship rolled and pitched to the motion of the waves, the sick man first lost control of his stomach, and then of his bowels. A rancid stench filled the hold, and soon all of the slaves were retching, crying out as they were assaulted by smells which, even on this ship, they knew were not natural.

Eventually their cries drew attention. Two of the crew came down, a lantern held in their hands. The light from the lamp slid across the walls of the ship, glancing over the faces of the stricken men, dancing across the tops of several wooden crates which were stacked in the middle of the room, until at last the yellow beam found the sick man on the floor. The two sailors spoke rapidly to each other in a language Ricardo did not understand, and then one of them went to the hatch and called up to someone above. His English was so thickly accented that Ricardo could barely catch a word.

_"...iz a negro... seekness an' worz... maybe dyzentery... smelz terrabul..."_

The first-mate descended three steps into the hold, and immediately lifted a handkerchief to cover his nose. He scowled at the sick negro, as if it was the slave's fault he had fallen ill.

"For God's sake, put him out of his misery," said the mate.

Ricardo watched, unable to move or speak, as the second foreign crewman pulled a knife from his belt, lifted the slave's head by his hair, and stuck the weapon through the back of the man's neck. There was a sickening _crick_ sound as the man's spinal cord was severed, and then the moaning ceased entirely.

A rushed Spanish prayer issued from Silvio as the negro's body slumped to the floor. Ricardo wanted nothing more than to tear his gaze away from the dead man's lifeless eyes... but he couldn't. He was completely transfixed, frozen by fear and horror. What kind of men would kill so coldly, so callously, without trying to physick a sick person first? Why hadn't they taken the negro to the deck and given him a bath of salt water, and a drink of grog?

"Get rid of the body, and then get this place mopped up before it spreads to the rest," the first-mate instructed the crewman. One of them said something too quickly for Ricardo to catch, and the mate responded with a nasty smile. "Then use the slaves. They've been bought to work, haven't they?"

Which was how Ricardo found himself unchained from the wall, picking up the dead man's feet as Tito lifted beneath the now-floppy arms. Together they man-handled the body out of the hold and up the stairs, onto the deck. The smell was unbearable, and Tito had to stop once to be sick. Ricardo coped by holding his breath, only inhaling through his mouth when he had the chance to turn his face away from the effluent-soaked corpse.

Whatever had been with the man, it must be bad, because the crew did not come near, though they held flintlock pistols trained on both freed slaves, in case either of them got any ideas. As Ricardo reached the rail of the ship, and started trying to lift the body over the side, he spoke in quiet Spanish to the man he now considered a friend.

"What has happened, Tito?" he asked. "Why did they kill this man?"

"Because he was sick," said Tito. His face was pale and sweaty.

"But you said that stuff we drink should stop us getting sick!"

"There is sick, and then there is sick." Tito took a deep breath, then edged the top of the body over the rail. "They think this negro had something called _dysentery_. It is a very bad sickness... one that can spread very easily, especially in confined quarters. They killed him because they thought he would infect us all if he lived."

Ricardo said nothing. He merely lifted the legs of the body, hoisting them over the rail, and watched as the ocean claimed the black, stained corpse.

"Will we get sick?" he asked at last.

Tito looked at him. "I don't know."

If Ricardo had thought his work was done, he was swiftly proved wrong. The crew handed both he and Tito a bucket full of steaming soapy water, and two mops. They were instructed to thoroughly clean the hold of any bodily fluids, and watched by a deck-hand armed with a cudgel.

It was long, tiring, disgusting work. When the water of the first bucket was fouled, it was taken away and emptied, and a fresh one brought down. Ricardo scrubbed so hard that his hands started to blister from the rough grain of the mop handle. He wasn't weak, or soft, but after almost a month away from toiling in the fields, his hands had forgotten what it felt like to hold a tool. Soon, even his blisters had blisters, and still the hot water came.

Finally, the first-mate was brought down, to inspect the hold. He deemed it worthy, and ordered Ricardo and Tito back to the deck. There, they were forced to strip and wash with yet more buckets of hot soapy water. After weeks of being ritually doused with cold seawater, this seemed an extravagance. But he was under no illusions; he and Tito were not being rewarded with hot water for a job well done. They were being made to cleanse themselves of any lingering sickness.

By the time they were finished washing, their skin was pink and clean, but then they had to wash their clothes, too. The boy with the flintlock was back—he never took the gun into the hold, for some reason—and he watched both slaves with hawkish attention. At last, as the sun was sinking down towards the empty horizon, the first-mate reappeared. With him was an older man, his clothes of finer cut than anything Ricardo was used to, his white beard kept short and neat. The older man watched both slaves, his steel-grey eyes aloof and indifferent.

"You're to watch them," the man said, to the mate. "All of them. We can't afford to lose any more. Make sure these two are given plenty of grog tonight. Tomorrow, you'll double the exercise regime for all of the slaves. The less time they spend down in the hold, the less chance of them getting sick."

"Aye, Captain."

Ricardo stood up, eyeing the white-haired man. So. This was the Captain? He did not look as fearsome as Ricardo had imagined. He looked like... well, like an old man, in fancy clothes. A man who was beyond his prime, and knew it.

"Why are you doing this?" he heard himself say. Before today, he would never have had the courage to speak out to his 'betters', to men who might kill him for a misguided display of impertinence. But he had just spent several hours up to his elbows in another man's blood, vomit and liquid faeces; any regard he had for propriety was now gone.

The man looked at him with those grey eyes, assessing Ricardo as if he was a piece of meat for sale. Then came the cold realisation; that's _exactly_ what he was to this man. He was not even a tool, for broken tools could be fixed, and were only discarded when they were completely beyond repair. Ricardo, and the other men in the hold, were not tools. They were flesh to _hold_ tools.

When the Captain took a step forward, unafraid of whatever dysentery might be lingering nearby, the boy with the flintlock fidgeted, unhappy with seeing his master so close to a slave who was guilty of murder. Ricardo saw the fidget from the corner of his eye, but he could not bring the focus of his gaze away from the age-lined, weather-worn face of the elderly captain.

"There are only two kinds of men in this world," Captain Hanso said. "Those who command, and those who serve. On this ship, I command." He lifted his arms, to indicate his crew. "And these men serve. They are paid for their service, because they are men with families, and needs. You, and those like you, are not even worthy of serving. You are already dead; your life was forfeit the moment you chose to commit a crime. Your soul is condemned to hell, but before it goes there, we may as well find some use for your body. You can still contribute to those of us who yet live. And perhaps, in that way, you may find some absolution before your empty body lies down for good. That is why I do this."

Ricardo felt his hand twitch into a fist. An overwhelming urge to strike this man came over him, but in that instant, he saw Isabella inside his mind. Her face, when she realised what he was about to do, was shocked, and sad. The man she had married had never once raised a hand in anger; not to her, not to another man, not even to his horse. The man she had loved had not been capable of violence.

He staggered back, as if struck.

_This is what they have made of me. They have made me in to an animal. A beast who wants to inflict pain to satisfy his own desires. But I won't do it. I won't become that animal. I won't hurt a man, not even a man who has hurt me. My hands may be stained with blood, but I am not a murderer. It was an accident. I must find a priest, one who will listen to my confession and not just damn my soul so that he can sell me to the highest bidder. I must atone for my crime, for the death I did not mean to cause. And I must not hurt another man again. I must remember who I am. I must remember Isabella._

"Take them back to the hold," said the Captain to the first-mate.

Ricardo did not object as he was forced back down into the bowels of the ship at sword-point. He did not speak as the manacles were clapped around his raw, scabbed wrists. And when the first-mate left, and the ship's intestines were in darkness once more, he did not respond when the other prisoners asked him what had transpired above, or enquired if he felt sick himself.

He did not speak, because he was too busy remembering Isabella's face. The soft curls of her brown hair. The way her lips quirked into a smile. Her doe-brown eyes as she looked at him shyly through her lashes. He sank to his knees and he remembered, because although he had promised he would save her, she would be the one to save him. Through Isabella was his own salvation.


End file.
